This 3-year study followed 14 kindergarten classrooms in Ontario as they used open-ended tablet applications to support outdoor play and learning. Through the creation of slideshows that incorporated their photos, video, drawings, and audio recordings, the children explored their physical and creative activities outdoors, as well as their…

The governments of many nations invest significant funding into early childhood education (ECE) programs. These programs play an important role in preparing early childhood educators for the workforce; however, it is unknown how many include training in outdoor play. We examined how outdoor play pedagogy is positioned in publicly-funded college…

This case study examines the policy significance of a partnership between two organizations committed to improving children's learning and well-being through the delivery of a forest and nature school (FNS) program offered in the context of a licensed childcare program in the province of Ontario, Canada. The notion of the Anthropocene is taken as…

Based on a government document review, 25 stakeholder interviews, and 7 site visits, we examined how and why outdoor play became a focus of Scottish policy for early learning and care programs; we also documented opportunities and barriers to policy implementation. The outdoor play emphasis began as a bottom-up initiative, with a few early…

This paper presents a case study of a private preschool in Thessaloniki, Greece. The school, located at the unique setting of an educational farm, has a curriculum focus on environmental education. An analysis of teacher interviews and lesson plans in the span of three years presents insights into the barriers teachers faced in implementing their…

While nature environments afford food for human consumption, there is a dearth of empirical inquiry that considers foraging as a sustainable, seasonal practice that builds human-nature relations. This gap in the literature is particularly apparent in early childhood education literature. Drawing on observations recorded at two forest-based nature…

The number of early childhood environmental education programs are on the rise in Canada and although young children have been quite marginalized from environmental education research, better understanding young children's relationships with the natural world is increasingly seen as important. Including young children themselves in research is…

The early years are a foundational time for the establishment of dispositions for learning. This paper draws on a recent study in Aotearoa (New Zealand) to illustrate ways educators have been implementing programs, within mainstream early childhood care and education settings, that inclusively offer Maori perspectives on caring for ourselves,…